Conditioned Response
by Asidian
Summary: "Don't move," they tell the asset, and they leave him standing naked in the center of the room.
1. Chapter 1

Author's Notes: Because apparently my ongoing WIP wasn't enough to meet my terrible-to-the-characters-I-love standards. Planning on one more chapter, in which Steve accidentally stumbles on the trigger words post CA:WS.

* * *

Conditioned Response – Chapter 1

* * *

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and they leave him standing naked in the center of the room.

The floor is polished steel; the walls are smooth, gleaming curves. At even intervals, bolts dot the metal, securing it in place. There is a single, circular window in the door that they pull closed behind them.

The Winter Soldier obeys.

He stands in the position they left him in; if he feels discomfort, he gives no outward sign. At the four hour mark, the asset's handlers confer, somber men in white coats, clustered around the sole window. They are pleased with the progress.

It is time for the next step.

The handler nearest the door, a balding man in round glasses, peers into the window. He observes the asset's posture and stance, and he manipulates the dials attached to the panel near the door.

Then he stands back to watch.

The metal room grows warmer at a rate of two degrees per five minutes.

When the asset begins to sweat, his handlers jot down the temperature. When he shifts his weight to keep his bare feet from contact with the hot metal of the floor, they note that, too.

At last the asset's voice rings out, in broken Russian, to see if anyone is there.

They retrieve him. Heat bakes out when they open the door, harsh waves of it. The Winter Soldier sways on his feet, and his hair is dripping.

"Come," says the man in glasses, and the asset obeys.

His steps are ginger. When he lifts his feet, the bottoms are mottled red, swollen with blisters.

He is presented with a cup of water. "Drink," says the asset's handler, and he obeys this, too.

They march him down a long hallway. He keeps pace, but stumbles twice, occurrences which are marked dutifully onto notepads.

When they reach the door labeled "Conditioning Chamber," the man with glasses sits the asset in a chair. The straps used to hold him are metal, and they fasten on top of skin gone red with the heat. Brisk hands disconnect the asset's left arm.

"You were told not to move," says the man in the glasses. "Your performance was unacceptable."

The Winter Soldier bows his head. "I will do better," he says.

"You will," his handler agrees. "Or you will come here again."

On the table in the Conditioning Chamber, there rest a variety of instruments. There are short ones and long ones, smooth and serrated. Some have wires. Some have clamps.

By the time the handler is finished, the Winter Soldier knows that he does not want to come here again.

* * *

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and they leave him standing naked in the center of the room.

Already, the walls are caked in ice; already, the hair on the asset's arm stands on end, rising up in gooseflesh.

They seal the door behind them, and they watch through a panel on the wall, one-way glass.

They note how he clenches his jaw and flexes his muscles, attempting to stave off the involuntary shudders brought on by the cold. They marvel that he goes so long before he begins to shake – before he brings his flesh arm in to press against his chest for warmth.

The asset's lips are blue when they retrieve him. His teeth clatter together.

"You disobeyed," says the balding man with glasses. When they lead the asset down the hall, his breathing picks up, although he should not remember this place.

They note the reaction on their paperwork, and they are pleased.

* * *

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and they leave him standing naked in the center of the room.

The Winter Soldier's face is gaunt and hollow. His hip bones are angular beneath skin gone pale and papery with malnutrition. Each rib is starkly evident.

In the interest of his conditioning, the asset's physical readiness has been allowed to reach substandard levels. After all, he cannot be deployed in the field until they can be certain of his obedience.

But despite this calculated deprivation, the Winter Soldier stands steady and unwavering, as though he were in perfect health. The handlers nod together; they remark upon his resilience.

At the five hour mark, a young scientist with trim, neatly-combed hair enters the room with a tray. On the tray are a thick slice of brown bread and a bowl of chicken broth. The asset's eyes track the objects from the moment they enter the room. His throat bobs as he swallows, but he makes no move to abandon his designated location. He makes no move to disobey.

The scientist sets the food on the floor before the Winter Soldier. Then he exits the room and closes the door.

At the seven hour mark, they consult their notes to confirm the last time the asset was provided with solid nutrition. They check dates and times, confer with painstaking records. He has been presented with food since the previous wipe, they determine. His inaction is not due to incomprehension.

They can only conclude that his conditioning has survived the reset.

When the first shift ends, new handlers come into rotation. They speak together in hushed, excited voices, and they congratulate one another. Their compatriots exit the facility, relieved of duty.

At the seventeen hour mark, the asset sways on his feet. He staggers, corrects himself, and at last remains standing.

Fifteen minutes later, he falls to his knees.

They wait to see what he will do. They observe his movements, the way his flesh hand makes a fist at his side. They hypothesize that he will at last reach for the tray.

But the asset does not. He braces his metal arm against the floor, and he struggles to push himself to standing.

When he fails, they retrieve him for his session in the Conditioning Chamber.

* * *

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and he stands on broken legs.

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and he ignores the hallucinations that leave phantom touches on his skin.

"Don't move," they tell the asset, and the Winter Soldier learns to obey.


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Notes: This fic is going to be another chapter, I think. I couldn't wrap it up like I'd been planning, and I want to spend time doing what I wrote the fic for in the first place. So! Expect a chapter three.

Big switch from the writing style in the first chapter, here, where I was going for curt and detached. Hopefully, I'm doing Steve justice. I felt like he got off to a rocky start, but with any luck it smoothed out toward the end.

* * *

Conditioned Response – Chapter 2

* * *

"Bucky," says Steve. "Would you slow down?"

Bucky doesn't slow down. He keeps right on going, head tipped forward so that his hair's in his eyes. It makes his expression impossible to read, when his face is covered up like that, but Steve can read the rest of him well enough. His movements are stiff and jerky, mechanical. His forearm's bleeding, and it's soaked straight through his black combat gear.

"Buck," he says, "just let me see. Okay?"

Through the strands of hair, Steve catches a glimpse of his friend's face. It's all hard edges and unforgiving lines.

He's like that, when they're in the field. Back comes the mask of the grim soldier, sweeping away the awkward advances that the man underneath has made. It scares him half to death, if Steve's honest with himself – and he always tries to be honest with himself.

But it's Bucky's choice, to be a part of this.

Six months ago, when the Green Goblin's pumpkin bombs rocked Broadway, the man who'd been the Winter Soldier had swept in like an avenging angel and reminded them all exactly how deadly he could be. Now, every time a call comes in from somewhere in the city, he falls in behind Steve like he's just enlisted, heading off to war.

And however much Steve worries, however much it tears him up to see the way his best friend slips into blank efficiency, he's willing to work through it, if that's what Bucky wants. It's Bucky's _choice_ – and God knows he's had enough choices stolen from him.

Steve won't take this one.

"Bucky?" he tries again.

The reply is terse, inflectionless. "It's nothing."

"You got shot, Buck. That's not nothing." He remembers a medic's tent in an earlier time, cloth bandages and a basin of water. He remembers Bucky on a stretcher with a wrung-out, defiant sort of smile, the kind that dared anyone to try and hold him back. He remembers a long night without sleep, stopping by the med tent so often the nurse finally told him she'd send someone to fetch him, if anything changed.

He wonders if Bucky remembers it, too. It's been coming back to him, lately – fragments of a former life.

But if Bucky recalls, he says nothing.

"We're due for debriefing," he tells Steve instead.

Steve watches him for an instant – takes in the tension in his shoulders and the way he holds his arm tucked in, just a little. It's his only acknowledgement of the pain. If there had ever been a good day for Tony to arrange a pick-up after a mission, today would've been it. But he's out in LA, and they're on foot, and now he's got a jerk who never takes care of himself on his hands.

Steve lengthens his stride, takes three steps to Bucky's two, and circles around in front of the other man. He plants himself directly in his friend's path. "The debriefing can wait."

Bucky pulls up short, lifts his eyes to Steve's. They're pale and flat, like the ocean on an overcast day. They stare at him, hard, for a few beats too long.

There was a time, not all that long ago, when a stare like that would've made Steve worry that a knife was going to come out. Now he knows that Bucky's just working things through.

At last his best friend shrugs, a twitch of the left shoulder. "If you say so," he says, and there's enough personality in that gesture, in those words, for Steve to understand that he's shifting out of mission mode.

He's standing down – for the time being, at least.

"Thanks," Steve says, and he means it. He smiles, encouraging and warm. "Let's get out of the street, okay? Some quick first aid, then Bruce can take a better look when we're back at the tower."

He leads Bucky to the Best Western they passed a block back. It's close – but more than that, it'll give them a little privacy. Bucky does better with most everything these days when he doesn't have an audience.

The clerk's got a television on behind the desk, and the news is on, sound down low. It's their exploits half the city away that are on replay. The camera zooms, and Bucky grabs a kid that looks about twelve by the arm, lifts him bodily out of the way as a brick wall bows outward and then comes down. His expression's all business, intent and cold, but he sets the boy down gently and leans in to talk to him. The audio's only picking up the news anchor's frantic voice and the crunch of metal, but Bucky nods toward the street farther down, clear from the fighting. Half a second later, the kid takes off running that way.

It's then that the hotel clerk hears their footsteps. She turns to greet them, mouth open to speak – and then just gapes instead, eyes gone wide.

"You –" she stutters. "You're –"

"A little tired," Steve tells her, offering a sheepish smile. He's aware that they're still covered in brick dust, that they look like they've just stepped out of a firefight.

There was a time when Bucky would've flirted, would've had a careless grin for this woman, injured or no. But he only waits behind Steve, face blank. A drop of blood from his arm hits the floor.

"Hey," says the clerk. "He okay?" She peers more closely at Bucky, frowns at what she sees. "I can call 911."

"It's nothing," Bucky tells her, and his tone is so distant, so unconcerned, that it really sounds like he means it.

"He's pretty tough," Steve tells her. "He just needs to rest for awhile." He digs into the hidden pocket of his suit, the one Tony insisted he add, to retrieve the emergency credit card that Tony insisted he carry. He sets it on the counter, trying not to think of the I-told-you-so smirk he'd be getting from Stark the next time they spoke. "Can we get a room, please? And borrow a first aid kit, if you've got one."

"Sure thing," says the woman. She picks up the card with a hand that shakes a little, runs it through the machine, and hands him back a receipt to sign. Next to the receipt she puts a cardkey and a square, white box with a red cross. "Room's down the hall on the left." She hesitates, bites her lip. "Hey," she says to Bucky. "You need an ambulance, you let me know. Okay?"

Bucky gives her a fixed sort of look, and then a careful nod.

"Thanks," Steve tells her, and steers Bucky away down the hall.

Behind them, the clerk's still peering after them, delicate brows furrowed in concern. She's pretty, Steve reflects – the kind of dame Bucky used to cut the rug with.

"She liked you," Steve says, conversationally. "You could've got her number."

They've talked about Bucky's girls before, staring up at the ceiling in Steve's room on sleepless nights. They've uncovered pieces of the past, lying in twin beds laid out side by side. It reminds Steve of their crummy old apartment, when they were nobody but a couple of dumb kids with their heads full of dreams.

Bucky's got bits and pieces of half a dozen girls back by now – memories of lined eyes, dark hair, a faded blue dress that buttons up to the collar. He remembers a double date they went on down at the Elgin, to see a detective flick with Humphrey Bogart.

He even remembers the smell of popcorn – but he hadn't known the word, that first night, hadn't known it was something you could eat. He'd tried, in the dark of Steve's room, voice faltering, to make himself understood. He'd tried to paint a picture of a thing he'd only caught in glimpses.

So Steve had given him the word back. Then he'd brought Bucky downstairs, at 2 am on a Tuesday, and made him a bag of popcorn in Tony's microwave. They'd eaten it on the sofa, in pajamas, and watched the Maltese Falcon on Tony's big, flatscreen television.

Bucky'd started the movie sitting bolt upright, almost like he was at attention. But as the time ticked by and the popcorn dwindled, he'd relaxed by slow degrees. By the end credits, he was leaning up against Steve's side, a steady weight, most of the tension gone out of him.

So when his best friend tilts his head like that and asks, "What would I do with her number?" Steve's traitor heart turns over, conflicted about whether that question is a joy or a tragedy.

"Nevermind, Buck," he says, and swallows.

They've reached the door to their room, and he fumbles with the keycard to get it open. He's only used one twice before – the tower is all voice access – and he gets the strip backward. He has to turn it around while Bucky watches, silent, and leaves another patter of blood on the floor.

The room is plain and clean. A pair of twin beds stand next to one another, a nightstand with a lamp between them. Bucky goes inside without being told, and Steve comes in behind him. He shuts the door and turns on the lights.

Steve presses the first aid kit into Bucky's metal hand and turns toward the bathroom. "Just a minute," he says. He's already thinking that they'll have to leave money for the towels; the blood will soak them right through. "I'll be back – don't move."

He grabs the washcloths and hand towels from the rack, runs two under the faucet to get them wet. Five seconds, and he's stepping back into the main room.

Five seconds, and something's gone terribly wrong.

Bucky's where Steve left him, but that's all that's the same. His posture's gone rigid, absolutely straight-backed. The first aid kit rests on his open left hand; the articulated fingers haven't curled to close around it. His right arm hangs by his side, hand balled into a fist.

And his face –

"Bucky?" Steve says, alarmed.

Bucky's eyes are empty – suddenly a thousand miles away, pupils dilated to twice their normal size. His jaw's clenched so hard that Steve can see the tendons in his neck standing out, and his lips press together in a thin, white line. He's not shaking, but a single long tremor runs through him and then subsides.

Aside from that, he is perfectly, eerily still.


	3. Chapter 3

Author's Notes: Annnd it's looking like this one needs one more chapter to wrap it up.

I rewrote every sentence in this chapter probably about three times. Good lord, the first draft was awful. I still think I ended up overdoing it. Oh, well. :(a

Also, between the end of this chapter and the flashbacks in my other fic, I think I need to write some pre-serum drabbles.

* * *

Conditioned Response – Chapter 3

* * *

"Bucky?" says Steve – and then, more urgently: "_Buck_?"

But Bucky's gone. It's like someone pulled a lever and turned off all awareness. His eyes are looking somewhere else, seeing things that are long gone.

Steve circles around in front of the other man, puts himself deliberately in the line of sight. "Hey," he says. "You with me, pal?" Part of him's expecting a combat knife in the ribs, but there's no reaction at all. Bucky lets him set a hand on his right shoulder.

Steve can feel how keyed up he is, through that single point of contact. He's drawn tight, like a rubber band stretched to the snapping point. Tiny shivers run through him, too slight to be visible, and his chest heaves in and out like he can't get enough air.

"Bucky," says Steve, and his voice is even, calm as he can make it. He brings his hand up to touch Bucky's face, hopes the contact will help ground him. "You hear me?"

His best friend's chest is hitching now, hard enough that Steve wonders if they're breaths or dry sobs.

"Listen," says Steve, low and urgent. "Your name is James Buchannan Barnes. We're in a Best Western in New York City. No one's here but us."

The change is subtle, but Steve's looking for it. Those iced-over eyes thaw, just a little, and they stop staring through him.

"There we go," says Steve. "You with me now?"

There's a furrow between Bucky's eyebrows, as though he's working through something he doesn't understand. He hasn't relaxed, not an inch, but there's recognition in his expression, at least.

Steve takes a slow breath in through his nose and lets it out. He turns his head so that he sees what Bucky sees. Nothing – a plain white door, the open bathroom. Nothing Bucky hasn't seen a hundred times before.

So he casts his mind back through his own actions, his own words. He replays entering the room, handing over the first aid kit, turning to get the towels. "I'll be back," he'd said. And then: "Don't move."

Steve frowns as the thought occurs, bringing with it a twist of unease. He stares hard at his best friend's face, at that fixed immobility.

"Buck," he says, and the fingers of his hand drift upward, card through Bucky's hair. "I want you to come with me. Okay?"

It's a gesture he knows from simpler days – bedridden with pneumonia, every gasp wet and stuttering. He recalls a rough, calloused palm checking for fever, lingering longer than needed, stroking hesitantly through his hair. It tears him up, that he didn't do half as good a job taking care of Bucky, when the tables were turned. "I want you to come and sit down. Can you do that?"

Bucky can't.

When he moves his hand so that he can apply gentle pressure to the other man's shoulder, attempting to guide him, Bucky balks and braces. It's like trying to move a tree. Probably, Steve could force the issue – could carry him, or strong-arm him step by resisting step. He might even be able to snap an order and have Bucky obey, the way he's acting right now.

But every part of Steve's screaming that those are awful ideas.

"You're bleeding," he says instead. "We need to get you fixed up." But the only response is the way his best friend's gaze meets Steve's for an instant and then pulls away, like he's too afraid to make eye contact.

It feels like someone's punched him in the gut. All the air goes out of him, and for a floundering couple of seconds, he can't speak. "Buck," Steve says at last, when he's able. "Listen. It's just you and me here. You see anyone else?"

Bucky's eyes dart, a quick check of his peripheral vision. Steve thinks he sees something like relief buried down under about fifteen layers of panic. It's not much, but it's a start.

"See?" Steve tells him. "Just us. Just a hotel room. And I want you to walk with me, over to the bed." His hand is still on Bucky's shoulder, and he rubs encouragingly. "You can move. I want you to." He waits a beat for that to sink in – notes that Bucky's watching him again, more steadily this time. "You understand? Nod if you understand."

There's a long stretch with no response – and then, jerkily, like he's Atlas trying to shoulder the world, Bucky nods.

"Good," Steve tells him. "Good. You're doing fine." The gulps for air have slowed a little; they're not under control yet, but they don't look as much like sobs, now. "You ready? Here we go."

Steve puts pressure on the shoulder again, urging him forward, and it's like a steel post. There's no yield at all, only solid muscle, rigid with tension.

Bucky's shaking now, and his right hand is opening and closing, fingers flexing like he's trying to hold onto something. He takes a single, awkward step, and the first aid kit falls from his metal hand to the floor.

"That's okay," Steve tells him. "Just keep going."

The second step comes just as hard. Bucky makes a noise, something low in his throat. Steve doesn't think he's aware of it, doesn't think he's aware of much right now, but it's soft and pained. Hearing it come from the throat of his best friend feels like someone just sliced him open and laid him bare.

"Come on, Buck," Steve says, and coaxes out step three. "There we go," he says, after step four. "Almost," he promises, and then they're standing by the foot of the bed, and Bucky's panting like he's just finished up the NYC Marathon.

"Okay," says Steve. "All done. Can you sit down for me?"

Bucky nods again, stiff and uncertain. It seems less that he sits and more that his legs give out, depositing him on the foot of the bed, but Steve's not complaining. "Good," Steve tells him. "Great. Now I'm gonna take a look at your arm. Okay?"

He circles back around for the first aid kit, doesn't take his eyes off of Bucky for a second while he does it.

Steve's been in the middle of firefights in the biggest war in human history. He's seen good men killed – lost friends and companions – kept going in the face of terrible odds because that's what needed to be done. He's not an easily shaken man.

But all the same, as he opens the first aid kit, his hands are unsteady.

He peels away Bucky's sleeve with care, notes that the other man doesn't flinch even though the material comes off wet and the wound underneath is raw and open, still bleeding.

Bucky was wrong about one thing: it's not nothing. Maybe the bullet missed the bone and passed on through, but the hole is ugly, is welling up, and Steve doesn't know when he took the hit to even guess how much blood he's lost. If the way his skin's gone pale and clammy is any indication, the answer's probably too much.

Steve's no medic, but he knows the basics. He knows where to put pressure, how to tie the bandage. When the blood seeps through, he knows to add another bandage on top of that.

He talks the whole time. He can't help it, and he doesn't care.

He tells Bucky where they are, what they were doing, that they're going home soon. He says the wound's not that bad, that it'll hold just fine until they can let Bruce take a closer look. He talks about the way they used to sneak up on the roof of their apartment building on hot summer nights, to watch the stars. He talks about how Bucky's ma used to make split pea pancakes the day they got their ration, and she never shooed Steve out but sat him down at the table and made sure he had a proper dinner. He talks about the time Bucky triple dared him to go skinny-dipping in the East River and then stole his clothes before he got out.

By the time he's done, he's out of words and bandages both. Bucky's eyes are fixed on his face, and his breathing's evened out, and his eyes don't have that fixed, fragile look anymore.

His best friend swallows, and it makes a clicking sound. "Thanks," he says, and his voice is wrecked, rough and uneven.

"You did the hard part," Steve tells him. He doesn't feel like smiling, but he makes himself offer one all the same. "Now sit tight. I'm gonna see about getting us home."

The infamous Black Widow answers on the second ring. "Barton," she says. "For the last time, this is an emergency number."

"Hi," says Steve. "Natasha? Can we get an extraction?"


	4. Chapter 4

Author's Notes: Extra special thanks to my father, an Air Force medic for 25 years. He got to put up with a very long, very rambling phone call about how blood transfusions are performed both in general and in very specific situations. All he said was "I'd better get credit when you publish it. Something like 'For my daddy, without whom it wouldn't have been possible.'"

So this is for my daddy, without whom it wouldn't have been possible. ^^

* * *

Conditioned Response – Chapter 4

* * *

Natasha opens the door to the hotel room looking cool and collected, a keycard in hand. She takes in the blood on the floor with a single sweep of her eyes, and she doesn't flinch. "Heard someone needed a ride."

"That'd be us." Steve's sitting on the bed by Bucky, has an arm around him and is rubbing his back in long, slow circles. He doesn't know if it's helping. He hopes it's helping. "Thanks for the pick up."

Natasha's gaze flickers to Bucky. She takes in the shuttered expression, the stiff posture. "I'll bring the car around," she says. "The loading dock's closer."

Then she disappears back through the door to the hallway.

"Hear that?" Steve asks Bucky. "We'll be out of here soon."

His best friend doesn't answer – but he nods, at least, a jerky little twitch of his head.

Five minutes later, Natasha reappears. "You boys ready?"

She's not the gentle type – has told Steve so in her wry, deadpan voice before. But all the same, she's careful, so careful, as she gets an arm around Bucky's other shoulder and helps Steve walk him out.

Steve's never been more grateful to her.

The car's a discreet, slate-grey sedan. Steve coaxes Bucky into the back seat and fastens his seatbelt for him, then climbs in on the other side so that he can be within easy reaching distance.

Natasha looks them both over when they're settled. "We good?" she asks, and her expression is all business, carefully washed of whatever thoughts are going on behind it.

"We're good," Steve tells her. "Thanks, Nat."

She drives, and the trip back to the tower 's a quiet one. Steve keeps a hand on Bucky's wrist the whole time. He hopes it'll be an anchor, something to draw back thoughts that start wandering places Bucky doesn't want them to go.

Natasha's eyes glance their way in the rearview mirror periodically. Steve finds himself thinking that she's gentler than she gives herself credit for.

"Mister Rogers," says Jarvis, when they arrive at the tower. "Mister Barnes. If you'll proceed to level three? Preparations have been made for your arrival."

Preparations take the form of a cot laid out with clean, white sheets. A bag of blood and tubing hangs from a thin metal frame. They've learned after a few close calls that it's important to keep blood types on file, just in case.

Protecting New York's not always the success stories the news clips show.

"Welcome back," Bruce says to Bucky, tone studiously mild. "Want to come and lie down for me?"

Bucky doesn't.

Maybe it's the medical equipment, or the overhead ceiling lights. Maybe it's Bruce's long, white coat. But Bucky plants in the doorway, and he lowers his head like the floor has all the answers. His hair falls forward and hides most of his face, but it's hard to miss the rigid line his jaw makes, or the way he's started shaking again.

"Bucky," Steve says.

He doesn't have to get any further. Natasha's already reaching with no-nonsense hands to peel the labcoat from Bruce's shoulders. "Change of plans," she says, smoothly. "Have you ever performed a blood transfusion in a hallway, Dr. Banner?"

And Bruce, thank heaven, smiles a wan, crooked smile, and just says, "There's a first time for everything, I guess." If the unexpected demand takes his stress levels up a bit higher than he's comfortable with, he does a good job of not letting it show.

They lie Bucky down on cushions against the wall, elevate his feet. Bruce tends him in a pale blue button-up and grey slacks, looking more like an office worker than a doctor.

He talks through the whole thing, calm and professional, explains that they're waiting for the crossmatch results while steady fingers sew shut the wound and apply a fresh bandage. His voice is low and even, and he doesn't make any sudden moves.

Bucky's metal fingers dig into the floorboards anyway, leave five splintered holes in the wood. He's breathing like he's gone the whole day in the training gym with no rest break, eyes a little vacant at the edges.

Steve gets down on the floor beside him, takes the other hand in his own. "Hey," he says. "Listen. We're in Tony's tower. Level three – you know, the doc's workspace."

And Bucky's eyes swim back into focus. He's still got a death grip on the ground beneath him, and he takes up another on Steve's hand, squeezing hard enough to hurt. But his breathing's better now, and when the transfusion starts, he doesn't jerk away – only watches, wary and still.

Steve's so busy gauging panic levels that he loses track of time until Bruce says, "All done. Take it easy for a few days, okay?"

* * *

Later, when Bucky's settled on the narrow bed next to Steve's, combat gear replaced with a baggy t-shirt and sweats, Steve doesn't ask, "Do you want to talk about it?"

The answer is always no.

When Bucky wants to talk, he will. When he needs to get something he's remembered out in the open, he just starts on his own – no preamble, like he's trying to sort out the jumble in his head and needs the words to do it. Asking won't bring it sooner.

So Steve doesn't ask. Instead he gets out the battered deck of cards he keeps on the bedside table, the box of sugar cubes he keeps in the drawer.

"I'll deal," he says.

They play poker for blocks of sugar, like they have for months, like they used to when money ran low between paydays before the war. Steve makes his bets and thinks of bare walls, of cheap meals, of mornings when the room was so cold they could see their breath. He remembers Bucky swearing he'd find another job, no fooling, that they'd get a place better than some crummy hole-in-the-wall apartment.

Bucky remembers that promise, too. It's one of the things he's talked about.

Steve raises, five whole cubes, and he wonders what those kids from Brooklyn would think of where they're staying now.

There's less drive for the prize, certainly. Tony's gleaming kitchen's always fully stocked downstairs, so the loser won't go a week and a half with bitter morning coffee. Still, the game passes the time, and that's the most important thing.

Bucky takes just about every hand – stacks his winnings, one after the other, in a tidy pile. He's always been good, and Steve's distracted, busy watching his best friend's face for tells that have nothing to do with whether he's bluffing.

He's almost cleaned out when Bucky reaches with the metal hand to select a sugar cube and crunch it absently between his teeth.

"You're not trying," he says, real casual, like it's not the first thing that's left his mouth since the hotel.

Steve misses a beat – wasn't expecting it. "Thought I'd go easy on you," he says at last. He smiles for show – an innocent smile, nice as you please, the kind that drives Bucky nuts. "Give you a chance."

Bucky's eyes come up from the cards. The corners of his lips twitch upward. "Play for real this time," he says, and he shoves half his winnings back across the table.

The relief is so sudden that it closes up Steve's throat.

This time, he plays for real.


	5. Chapter 5

Author's Notes: Thank you so, so much to the incredibly helpful and talented 404, who was kind enough to give me a very thorough beta and a great number of suggestions, many of which I took.

I may dabble in this verse in the future, but I'm pretty happy with this as an end point for this fic. I hope you enjoyed the trip!

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Conditioned Response – Chapter 5

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It's three weeks later when a voice rises up from the narrow bed beside his, apropos of nothing, just after Steve thinks Bucky's finally drifted off to sleep.

"That's the order they used to give me. When they were trying to make my training stick."

The room's dark. Some of the city light filters in between the curtains in long, pale strips, but it's not enough to make out an expression, or even a face. Bucky's just a silhouette, a mound beneath some blankets in the dark.

_That's the order they used to give me. _Steve rewinds the events of the evening, then the afternoon that came before, trying to place the reference.

It's been a good day.

Bucky took Clint on at ping-pong and whipped him soundly, gloated about it with relentless cheer and a smug smile. They walked through Central Park to see the statue of Alice, a child's dream in bronze – sculpted after their time, but a landmark now, apparently. At dinner, Bucky had two bowls of Bruce's potato chowder, three rolls, and a glass of milk. When he wanted more, he took more; he didn't just lower his head and go still the way he used to, unwilling to touch anything without permission.

It's been more than a good day. It's been a _great_ day – so Steve casts his mind further back, looking for answers elsewhere, instead.

"What I said," he asks at last, carefully, "at the hotel?"

"Don't move," Bucky confirms, and his voice is tight.

Steve wishes he could see. He wants to know what those words have done to his best friend's face, but he's sure that's why Bucky waited until now – for the night to cover him up and keep him hidden.

"It started out pretty easy, you know? There was – it was just this empty room. They'd give the order and they'd leave. So I'd stand there." He pauses for an instant; Steve can picture him licking at his lips, the way he does sometimes when he's nervous. "It was a long time sometimes, but not so bad. Nothing I couldn't handle."

The shadow that's Bucky shifts a little, a movement Steve can't quite read. The knob to turn on the lamp is twelve inches away on the bedside table, but that might as well be miles.

"So they made it harder." Bucky's tone is flat and remote, like he's reading off a shopping list. "They'd do things to the floor. Heat it, freeze it. Once they broke glass." Steve can hear him swallow. "And they'd want me to stand there."

All of a sudden, dinner's a dead weight in Steve's stomach, and the dark blooms with images he can't blink away: Bucky, muscles strung taut and strained, holding some pose for hours or days. Bucky stock-still in a puddle of his own blood, feet flush on broken glass. Bucky's face, schooled expressionless, blank despite the pain. Blank because it has to be.

When the words come again they lurch a little, like they're being dragged out into the open. "I got good at it. _Not moving_." Steve can hear the bitter grimace. "But however good I got –" Bucky breaks off. When he starts up again, there's a waver in his voice that wasn't there before. "I couldn't do it right."

Buck's always been good at pretending things are okay.

He'd lost his job once, when the factory shut down – kept them both going on a wing and a prayer – and it'd been six weeks until Steve had even known something was wrong. But between one breath and the next, whatever bravado's brought Bucky this far deserts him.

Steve reaches out across the space between them and offers his hand. In the unlit room, it's an invisible gesture, so he lets the weight of it settle on Buck's blankets, lets him know it's there. After a few seconds, he feels warm fingers thread into his own.

"They'd have me hold things," Bucky continues, and Steve can hear desperation creeping in around the edges. "With my real hand. Sometimes just weight, and I had to keep my arm up." There are tremors in the fingers that clasp Steve's. "Or sometimes this – I don't know. This thing. It got real hot, like a poker in a fire."

Steve closes his eyes, as if to keep from seeing, but he sees it anyway. And as he sweeps his thumb in slow arcs across Bucky's palm, an old soothing gesture, the patches gone scarred and calloused read like braille. Steve can't keep from imagining the wounds burned in, session after session, until the skin grows rough enough to protect itself. Until Bucky stands there and accepts it.

Here and now, in the adjacent bed, Bucky makes a terrible, breathless sound that might be a laugh. "And once – Christ, Stevie, they didn't feed me. I would've given my other arm for something like dinner tonight, and they – gave the order. And they put this piece of bread in my mouth."

Steve can picture that, too, however much he doesn't want to. It's so real, it feels like it's flaying him open: Bucky's eyes dull and empty, aiming for stoicism – Bucky opening his mouth on command, even though he knows what's coming. He thinks of white coats jotting notes while Buck fights not to swallow, and it's the worst thought he's ever had.

The cold rush of horror bottoms him out. He can feel it all the way down in his toes, a sick wave that leaves him light-headed.

"It was like I couldn't win. Every time I'd say, 'Whatever they throw at me, I can take it.' And every time they'd prove me wrong." The words grind to a stop. Steve can hear him breathing, ragged but soft, trying to be calm.

"Buck," Steve begins. _It's over_, he wants to say. But the man beside him starts talking again, as though he's afraid the interruption will derail him.

"So I'd fuck up," he says. "I always did, in the end. And then we'd have to go –" Bucky trails off, and the beat of silence that follows is suffocating. Something worse is coming, Steve knows, but he can't fathom worse.

"Buck –"

"To a different – another room. They –" The sentence splinters when Bucky's voice finally breaks. Steve can hear him breathing; the breaths are loud and close together like he's drowning, gulping air.

Steve squeezes Bucky's hand, tries to bring him back. He's reaching for the lamp when Bucky grates out, at last:

"The _conditioning_ chamber," The syllables are raw, like he's pulled the admission out by force. Below the blankets, Bucky's form shudders visibly, and the hand holding Steve's has gone cold.

For a few seconds the only sound is Bucky breathing, trying to control himself – and, somewhere in the city below them, a car alarm bleating.

"And I always thought – next time I'd try harder. I'd – I'd do whatever they wanted." There's that sound again, too awful to be laughter, only now it's rough at the edges, like old cloth coming unraveled. "They coulda had me do anything."

It's not hard to hear the self-loathing. Bucky's voice is thick with it, with disgust and shame and a hundred other things too subtle to put names to.

And Steve – Steve's never felt anything like the bone-deep rage that settles over him now. It comes all at once, a driving need to track down every last monster who stood by and let this happen.

He's fought a war, killed men, but never before has he felt an impulse like this one, hot and immediate, to end a life – personally, deliberately, with his own bare hands.

But the men who did this are dead already, most of them – dead after long, full lives, while the damage they inflicted still eats Bucky up inside. All of a sudden, the anger is gone, leaving something sick and weary in its place.

There's things he wishes he could do, or say, or fix. But it seems like he's half a century too late for all of them.

All he's got is now.

So Steve says, "Hey," and he's not surprised to find that his throat is tight. "You want company over there?"

There's a pause, and Bucky disentangles their hands. The mattress creaks when he scoots over, and that's answer enough.

Steve sits on the edge of the blankets, and he sets his hand on Bucky's shoulder – the flesh one, the one without the memories attached. He can feel the muscles standing out, rigid as steel; he can feel Bucky shaking.

He remembers winters in Brooklyn, when the cold would get in his lungs so that every gasp was a struggle. He remembers Bucky sitting like this, so close Steve could feel his warmth through the covers. He remembers waking from fever dreams, coughing so hard he retched, and Bucky there with a bucket and a cup of water.

Steve misses those days, suddenly and fiercely. He misses the simplicity of them. He misses knowing that whatever happened – whatever else went wrong – Bucky was safe, and whole, and strong.

"Buck," he says, after a while. "You know that's all done with. Right?"

There's no reply for a long moment. "I almost killed you," Bucky says at last. He holds it up like a shield – like he's daring Steve to say otherwise.

But Steve knows better.

He thinks of the long, sleek lines of the Insight carrier. He thinks of three separate shots that missed vital organs. He thinks of Bucky, back before whatever hellish training Hydra put him through, back before even his sniper work in the Army – a gap-toothed twelve-year-old with an infectious grin and skinned knees, in the abandoned lot where Mikey's Lumber used to be. He remembers Buck lining up cans on the low brick wall and knocking them down with a sling at fifty paces, neat as you please.

Then he thinks of Bucky's voice, choked with remembered pain, saying, "They coulda had me do anything."

But when it came down to it, they _couldn't_.

Steve says none of that. "I don't die that easy," he tells Bucky, instead. "Too stubborn to leave you on your own again, I guess."

He feels the inhale when Bucky's chest hitches, a little stutter and then a sharp gust out. Another comes on its heels, in perfect silence.

"You better mean that, punk." Bucky's voice is rough, strangled. "I'm gonna hold you to it."

Steve's aware of everything in that moment: the warmth of Bucky's side through the blanket; the stinging at the corners of his own eyes; the city lights outside the window, filtering in through the curtains.

"Hey," he tells his best friend. "That's fine by me."


End file.
